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Bantu Stephen Biko (1946-1977) was a South African antiapartheid activist and leader of the BCM. Born in Eastern Cape to a poor Xhosa family, Biko’s activism began in 1966, when he started medical school at the University of Natal, Non-European Section, in Durban. Biko got involved with NUSAS, one of the most important organizations in South Africa’s antiapartheid movement. Two years later, however, he broke away from NUSAS and formed SASO, an all-Black organization dedicated to the advancement of Black students through the promotion of Black Consciousness (See: Index of Terms), an ideology he developed alongside other Black student leaders. Biko served as SASO’s first president in 1969. The following year, he was appointed as SASO’s Publicity Secretary (1).

Biko became more engaged politically after leaving university in 1972. That year, he began working for Black Community Programs (BCP), a major component of the BCM. He remained active in politics until March 1973, when the South African government banned him and seven other SASO members, preventing them from traveling, speaking in public, and publishing. While restricted to his home in Kingwilliamstown, Biko founded the Eastern Cape Branch of the BCP, serving as branch executive until a new clause inserted in his banning order in 1975 prevented him from continuing this work.

In August 1976, the government detained Biko and other Black leaders under Section 6 of the Terrorism Act. He was released without charge 101 days later, only to be detained once again in Port Elizabeth on August, 18 1977 (2). Biko died in detention less than a month later, after being interrogated for 22 hours, while handcuffed, shackled, and chained to a grille. Scholars have not determined precisely what happened to Biko, but he appears to have been beaten by at least one police officer, an incident that left him with severe head injuries, according to his autopsy (Boucher, Jesse. “The Possibility of Care: Medical Ethics and the Death of Steve Biko.” Journal of Asian and African Studies, 2012. 567-79).

Biko remained an influential figure in the antiapartheid movement even after his death. News of his death spread quickly and attracted global attention. Protesters gathered in several cities and held up Biko’s death as a symbol of the abuses of apartheid. In 1978, followers of Biko’s ideas reorganized as the Azanian People’s Organization, which later branched into the Socialist Party of Azania.

Biko is now viewed as the “Father of Black Consciousness” and the first icon of the antiapartheid movement. In 2008, Manning Marable and Peniel Joseph, two leading American scholars of Black history, wrote that Biko’s death “created a vivid symbol of Black resistance [that] continues to inspire new black activists” (Marable, Manning and Joseph Peniel. “Series Editors’ Preface: Steve Biko and the International Context of Black Consciousness.” Biko Lives! Contesting the Legacies of Steve Biko, 2008). Similarly, on the 25th anniversary of Biko’s death, Nelson Mandela called Biko “the spark that lit a veld fire across South Africa,” adding that the government “had to kill him to prolong the life of apartheid” (Mandela, Nelson. “A Tribute to Stephen Bantu Biko.” Biko: A Life, Xolela Mangcu ed., 2014).